The latest round brings the company's total of capital raised to more than $27 million.

Vue.ai, which describes itself as a “platform for intelligent retail automation,” said it raised $17 million in a Series B funding round led by Falcon Edge Capital along with Sequoia Capital India and Global Brain, which is a GP of KDDI Innovation Fund.

The latest round of funding brings Vue.ai’s total of capital raised to $27.5 million.

Vue.ai was founded three years ago by Ashwini Asokan and Anand Chandrasekaran as the first artificial intelligence brand from parent company Mad Street Den. The founders said they’ve built a team at Vue.ai that is “comprised of neuroscientists and AI experts from IBM, Intel and DARPA,” and serves retailers in the U.S. and the U.K. as well as in India, the Middle East and Latin America.

With this round of funding, the company has set its sights of further build its team and expand its business. “After experiencing a four-times annual revenue increase, the funds will be used to grow the team, deliver on the product roadmap and scale the company’s existing customer base that already includes leading retailers from across the globe like Macy’s, Mercado Libre and Tata,” the company said in a statement.

Vue.ai’s growth trajectory aligns with massive investments in AI being made by retailers and brands. Juniper Research expects global retailers and brands to dole out more than $7 billion in AI technologies over the next few years. “Retailers have entered an era where consumers expect a seamless brand experience thanks to behemoths like Amazon and Alibaba who are using AI to personalize products and services for shoppers,” Vue.ai said.

Meanwhile, consumers also continue to crave experiences. “The future of retail is entertainment,” said Asokan, founder and chief executive officer of Vue.ai. “The experience economy we see today is the start of that era. Brands are shifting to designing worlds that consumers want to be a part of and that has to integrate with the new ways people shop. Vue is the electricity that powers all these complicated and important retail functions so retailers can focus on the business of entertaining you.”

For its part, Vue.ai positions itself as a “one-stop shop across the value chain” while automating “critical functions across departments heavily dependent on human intuition, unifying data about products, people and processes,” the company said adding that its suite of products is designed to offer retailers and brands a “unified system” that acts as a “neural network” for decision-making.

Essentially, the platform can automate e-mail marketing and personalization processes — whether on a web site or in-app — as well as product tagging functions and inventory management. This platform also includes visual search and product discovery as well as “styling and outfitting” prompts and model generation, which serve as a personalized stylist for consumers. The aim is to make the shopping experience easier and more engaging.

Chris Homer, cofounder and chief technology officer of ThredUp, said “creating personalized shopping experiences for our customers is a top priority. With over 2 million unique items in inventory at any given moment, we are constantly innovating on ways to help each customer locate the perfect needle-in-a-haystack item.”

With Vue.ai, Homer said the platform’s AI stylist “allows us to personalize the end-to-end customer experience. AI algorithms take into account each individual’s visual style preferences, brand affinities, price sensitivity and more, creating a significant impact on multiple touchpoints in the ThredUp customer’s journey — whether you’re browsing ThredUp, reading an e-mail or opening your custom-curated Goodybox. ThredUp is revolutionizing resale by making it just as easy to shop used as it is to shop new, offering a tailored experience powered by technology.”

Anandamoy Roychowdhary, director of technology at Sequoia Capital India, said Vue.ai is on “a mission to put AI and intelligent automation in the hands of teams across the globe in ways that improve productivity and growth multifold.”

Social Studies

You might not know who Beanie Feldstein is now, but the breakout star is poised to be a name synonymous with comedy. ⁣⁣
⁣⁣
Beanie stars in @OliviaWilde's directorial debut "Booksmart," opening today. The film has been dubbed the female "Superbad" — which is somewhat ironic since Beanie is actor Jonah Hill's younger sister. ⁣⁣
⁣⁣
“She is sort of like Paris Geller meets Lisa Simpson with a little bit of Sandra Bullock in ‘Miss Congeniality.’ I liked the idea of showing that a girl can be silly and loose with her friends and also be really intense and kind of biting at school,” Beanie said of her character, Molly.⁣ ⁣
⁣
The actress also said that Wilde’s take on the story is “fresh and honest” and she was “whip-smart” in her directorial debut.⁣
⁣⁣
Tap the link in bio for more. ⁣⁣
Report: @leighen⁣
📸: @jgreenery
.
.
.
.
.
#wwdeye
#booksmart
#beaniefeldstein

It looks like Kris isn't the only momager in the Kardashian-Jenner family. ⁣
⁣
Kim Kardashian is setting up son Psalm West for success in the fashion, beauty and home sectors — at the ripe old age of two weeks. ⁣
⁣
On May 18, Kardashian filed a trademark for her son for “Psalm West” under her company, Kimsaprincess, according to the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office. ⁣
⁣
Now all of the West children have trademarks filed under their names. ⁣
⁣
Tap the link in bio for more. ⁣
Report: @laylailchi
.⁣
.⁣
.⁣
.⁣
#wwdfashion⁣
#kimkardashian⁣
#psalmwest

Natalie Portman, Uma Thurman, Kate Moss, and Roger Federer at the Moët & Chandon in France. ⁣
⁣
The intimate dinner celebrated the 150th anniversary of its Brut Imperial blend, at its just-reopened Château de Saran overlooking the vineyards of the Champagne region in the east of France.⁣
⁣
There were fireworks, towering pyramids of Champagne glasses — plus vines and VIPs as far as the eye could see. ⁣
⁣
Tap the link in bio for more. ⁣
⁣
Report: @fleurfleurette
.
.
.
.
.
#wwdeye
#moetchandon

Shailene Woodley has no desire to keep up with the superficial standards of Hollywood.⁣
⁣
“If you look at Hollywood — and I’m no saint in this regard — but every single time somebody gets a little bit more famous, they get a little bit thinner, and they get a little bit blonder, and they get a little bit more defined in their face,” Woodley says. ⁣
⁣
“There’s sort of this sense of machinery that can happen to people in the limelight, and I was very fortunate also at a young age to work with so many incredible, strong women who were already a little rebellious in their own ways against the machinery that can be this industry.” ⁣
⁣
Tap the link in bio for more.⁣
⁣
Report: @leighen ⁣⁣
Styling: @thealexbadia⁣
📸: @ninebagatelles⁣
Production: @jgreenery⁣
Beauty: @keithcarpenterhair & @tyronmachhausen ⁣
Market: @andrew_shang & @elmercer⁣

The Prada Group is going fur-free. ⁣
⁣
The company will no longer use animal fur in its designs or new products, starting from the spring/summer 2020 women’s collections. ⁣
⁣
Creative director Miuccia Prada explained that the company “is committed to innovation and social responsibility,” and that its fur-free policy “is an extension of that engagement.”⁣
⁣
Tap the link in bio for more.⁣
Report: @luisazargani
.⁣
.⁣
.⁣
#wwdfashion⁣
#prada⁣
#furfree

Soccer superstar Lionel Messi is launching an apparel collection. ⁣
⁣
The Argentine athlete, who captains both FC Barcelona and the Argentina national team, has partnered with MGO, a brand portfolio company whose chief creative officer is Tommy Hilfiger’s sister, Ginny Hilfiger, to create Messi.⁣
⁣
The premium lifestyle brand with “a sporty edge” will be primarily men’s wear but will include a few women’s tops as well, according to Hilfiger.⁣
⁣
Hilfiger said despite his fame and wealth, Messi “is a really humble, generous and kind person and a great role model. He has been involved since we started talking to the Messi family two-and-a-half years ago when we presented the idea to them. ⁣
⁣
Tap the link in bio for more. ⁣
⁣
Report:⁣ @jeanpalmieri
.⁣
.⁣
.⁣
.⁣
#wwdfashion⁣
#LionelMessi ⁣
#FCBarcelona⁣
#mgo⁣
#GinnyHilfiger

Once upon a time in Cannes, @ellefanning had another major red carpet-moment in @Dior.
Tap the link in bio to read what growing up in Hollywood was like for the youngest-ever jury member at Cannes.
.
.
.
#wwdfashion
#ellefanning
#dior
#onceuponatimeinhollywood

Shailene Woodley is an all-in or not-at-all kind of woman — leading her to get the reputation as the hippie of Hollywood. ⁣
⁣
She views her experience of “breaking out,” if you will, as a kind of shepherding by older, wiser female costars along the way, women she says helped her steel herself against the superficial demands of the industry. ⁣
⁣
One of those women, @reesewitherspoon, spoke to us about Woodley's inspiring performance on "Big Little Lies." “Her portrayal of a woman who is both a survivor of sexual assault and a single mother raising her child alone in a new community is one of the most truthful performances I’ve ever seen. There is a scene in episode two of this season where Jane explains her assault to Ziggy that moves me to tears every time I see it," Witherspoon said. ⁣
⁣
Woodley's acting choices have earned her a reputation for being a talented and utterly professional one to watch, but it’s her candid, unabashed activism in real-life that people are taking notice of. ⁣
⁣
“I think it’s very easy for all of us to be comfortable in our bubbles and to be comfortable in the lives of privilege that a lot of us live, to be comfortable in our own space, in our own opinions, in our own forms of what we think is right or wrong, black and white, justice and non-justice — but ultimately until every single person on this planet feels like they are treated like a proper human being, I’m not going to stop because more than anything, I’m just somebody who deeply feels,” Woodley said.
⁣
⁣
Tap the link in bio for more. ⁣
⁣
Report: @leighen ⁣
Styling: @thealexbadia
📸: @ninebagatelles